Apart from the more specific methods to be dealt with faith has always been an essential factor in the practice of medicine, as illustrated by the quotations just given from Burton. Literature is full of examples of remarkable cures through the influence of the imagination, which is only an active phase of faith. The late Daniel Hack Tuke’s book, ‘The Influence of the Mind on the Body,’ is a storehouse of facts dealing with the subject. ‘While in general use for centuries, one good result of the recent development of mental healing has been to call attention to its great value as a measure to be carefully and scientifically applied in suitable cases. My experience has been that of the unconscious rather than the deliberate faith healer. Phenomenal, even what could be called miraculous, cures are not very uncommon. Like others, I have had cases any one of which, under suitable conditions, could have been worthy of a shrine or made the germ of a pilgrimage. For more than ten years a girl lay paralysed in a New Jersey town. A devoted mother and loving sisters had worn out lives in her service. She had never been out of bed unless when lifted by one of her physicians, Dr. Longstreth and Dr. Shippen. The new surroundings of a hospital, the positive assurance that she could get well with a few simple measures sufficed, and within a fortnight she walked round the hospital square. This is a type of modern miracle that makes one appreciate how readily well-meaning people may be deceived as to the true nature of the cure effected at the shrine of a saint. Who could deny the miracle? And miracle it was, but not brought about by any supernatural means.’[7]
If, then, faith is so important an adjuvant to ordinary medical treatment, we see at once that religion that stands for faith in its highest and purest form should represent a tremendous recuperative force. We have said that medicine and religion had become estranged—the one given over to a rigid materialism, and the other so busy with men’s souls that it forgot their bodies altogether. This book is a humble attempt to bridge over the gulf. There is a great movement that has its roots in history that is already written and that will go on into the far distant future, around about us. It is a movement that stands for Idealism and Optimism. It is the harmonising of all kinds of human experience into one great philosophy. Scientific medicine is coming to reconsider its position and to realise its responsibilities. This synchronises with a broadening of the basis of Christian teaching. Without abandoning any of the cardinal tenets of their faith, the churches are coming to see that Christianity is a much more wonderful truth than they had ever dreamed; and, instead of there being any conflict between Christianity and science, science, like all work for the good of humanity, must be an integral part of the Church’s service to mankind.
Medicine and religion had a common origin in pagan temples, and we have already seen that in medieval times all such learning was the monopoly of the monks. Healing by means of influence on the mind of the patient is no newer a branch of the art than surgery or treatment by drugs. History abounds with instances of cures effected at shrines by means of relics, and by saints. Of all modern pilgrimage shrines the one in the Pyrenees is by far the most famous. That cures actually take place at the Grotto of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception at Lourdes is undeniable. The cases have been medically diagnosed and the certificates may be examined in the Record Office at Lourdes where such documents are preserved. Whether such cures differ in character from other cures by what is termed suggestion is an open question. In fairness to those who believe them to be due to the direct intervention of the Almighty it is perhaps only right to give here the opinion of Mr. Butlin, the President of the Royal College of Surgeons, who recently said:
‘When such cures take place in the presence of vast masses of people, although it may be possible to explain all the steps through which the emotion has produced the “cure,” how can we be surprised that the people fall on their knees before God and bless His holy name for the miracle which He has wrought?
‘I defy anyone to read Zola’s story of the cure of Marie le Guersaint, written by a sceptic (Zola’s “Lourdes”), without being moved by it and without feeling convinced that all true Catholics who were present, priests and people, with the unhappy exception of the Abbé Pierre Froment, truly believed that Almighty God had been moved by the intercession of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception to display His divine power by instantaneously restoring the health of the poor girl who had lain paralysed upon a couch for seven years. In the eyes of all who witnessed it, it was a miracle, for every medical man who had seen her had, with one exception, believed her to be suffering from a damaged spinal cord. There is therefore no excuse, in such a case as this or in ninety-nine out of one hundred cases which are cured by faith, to impute dishonesty and deliberate deception to the priests and the people who proclaim such cures to be the work of God. From the little I have seen of the priests actively engaged in the grotto at Lourdes, I can feel no doubt that the most of them honestly believe that the cures which they have seen are genuine. I would no more think of accusing them of deliberate deception than I would accuse my own relative of it.’[8]
We have spoken of a great movement, that tends to bring into closer co-operation all human effort and to consecrate it to one ideal—the service of mankind.
We are here more particularly concerned with a smaller movement that exists within the greater. It has made itself felt at Church Conferences and at Medical Councils. It is a movement to bring the medical profession and the Church into a closer practical connexion to fight disease. That such an intimate co-operation is not only desirable but possible, the thoughtful chapters contributed to this book by eminent authorities go to show. As regards the general principle underlying this joint work for the sick, the Archdeacon of London recently gave expression to what would appear to be the feeling of the leading ecclesiastics and foremost physicians in his charge to the clergy of his archdeaconry in the following words:
‘Religion and medical science should always co-operate, while the ultimate responsibility must lie with the accredited physician.’
When the scheme for the present volume was drawn up over a year ago, it was felt that some authoritative statement was needed to guide the public in thinking out the topical questions of Spiritual Faith or Mental Healing. There has, in recent years, been an endless series of books issued from the European and American presses on this subject. Some of these publications being obviously the hand-books of societies whose name spelt their own condemnation, thinking people passed them by, but, on the other hand, much literature of a very misleading character has been placed on the market and purchased by many in the belief that they were learning from it the official views either of the Church or of the medical profession, or of both. The qualified medical practitioners of this country do not lightly decide to give expression to their views on therapeutics in books issued to the general public, and whenever they circulate opinions it may be taken for granted that they are the result of patient investigation of facts and of carefully thought out conclusions deduced from those facts. If one may be allowed to indicate in a general way the position taken up by the doctors who have written for the following pages, it is one of scepticism towards quasi-miraculous healing as a practical means of combating disease, but at the same time it is an attitude of extreme cordiality towards the minister of religion—in his capacity as a messenger of hope and expert in peace of mind. Of all the weighty evidence that has been gathered together to build up this book, the opinion of Sir Clifford Allbutt forms no unimportant section. Few of us can escape sickness altogether, and although some illnesses may be blessings in disguise, nevertheless our desire for health is only second to our desire for life, and it is right that it should be so. ‘The highest spiritual life depends on the best bodily health,’ Sir Clifford Allbutt tells us. The Bishops at Lambeth admitted with regret that ‘sickness has too often exclusively been regarded as a cross to be borne with passive resignation, whereas it should have been regarded rather as a weakness to be overcome by the power of the spirit.’ That there exist potentialities of healing apart from physic to-day no one can refute, but it is to be feared the Church and the medical profession have much lost ground to recover, through having in the past ignored those psychic forces that are now the object both of scientific inquiry and of theological study. The marvellous chemical discoveries of the past few years have revolutionised scientific conceptions. New theories of matter and of energy are being framed to explain the result of new researches. The wonders of radio-activity have converted the scientist from a materialist who believed in nothing unrevealed by test-tube or microscope, into an idealist prepared to argue from the unseen to the seen. Just as there are in the world of physical science forces whose existence we are only now beginning to recognise and whose capabilities are still unknown to us, there are undoubtedly psychic forces in man that are capable of development, but of whose exact nature we at present are ignorant, although we can trace their effects.[9]
‘In the case of vital truth . . . it may be necessary for a writer to say some hard things,’ but criticism, prompted by no petty spirit, but by a noble desire to bring out the best, will never be resented by right-minded people. Two great and noble professions are about to make a combined attack on sickness and suffering. They have too great a sense of their responsibility to enter upon such a campaign lightly. Much counsel is needed before the allies can give battle.